Letters from Saratoga News readers

I feel for Gisela Wiedmer who lost a tree full of apricots overnight ("Open letter to the Saratoga apricot thief," letters, June 13). It happened to me several years ago and I was just as horrified.

I conjectured that it could not have been a person, who would have needed a tall ladder to reach the top of the tree. With the help of my pest control person, we found evidence adhering to the trunk of the tree. The apricots had been taken by at least two raccoons.

Rosemary Wong

Chadwick Court

A look at Hakone Gardens, in the past and present

Thank you for the story by Khalida Sarwari ("Matsuri will celebrate everything Japanese," May 9) informing readers of 15th annual Japan Festival at Hakone. This pre-event publicity was a factor in the incredible turnout at the festival.

Having experienced Hakone as a privately owned garden, I was amazed to be joining an exuberant gathering of 2,500 people at the Matsuri. Hakone has come a long way from being an estate designed for one couple.

It was 1915 when Isabel Stine was inspired to create a Japanese estate after visiting the Japanese exhibition at the Pan Pacific Exposition in San Francisco. Isabel and Oliver Stine traveled to Japan and fell in love with Fuji-Hakone National Park in Japan. They employed the finest Japanese architect and a renowned Japanese landscape gardener for building their own Hakone in Saratoga.

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In 1932, the next owner was Major C.L. Tilden, who added the large main gate to the gardens. When he died, his sister, Mrs. Walter Gregory, owned the property until she passed away in 1959. In 1961 her son, Michael Gregory, sold the estate to a partnership of six couples who used it as a private retreat. The partners built the access road and made restorations and enhancements. But they never changed the original aesthetics of the garden or added anything that was not authentically Japanese.

The partnership that owned Hakone was comprised of four Chinese American couples--John and Mary Young (my parents), George and Marie Hall, John and Helen Kan and Dan and June Lee--along with Joe and Clara Gresham and their son Eldon and daughter-in-law Deon of Saratoga. It was a congenial group of friends and families, but we never came all at one time to Hakone. The gardens were so formal and elegant, we visited in small groups.

As a student, I escaped from Mills in Oakland with three friends to study in the upper house because it was quiet and no one would disturb us. Hakone's resident caretaker, Charley Ray, an African American, made sure we did not leave a single scrap of paper on the pristine grounds.

In 1966 the partners felt it was no longer practical to own Hakone as a private retreat. After all the effort and expense to keep Hakone exquisitely beautiful and authentic, they did not want the estate to be sold to a developer who would subdivide the property. Their idea was for the Japanese garden to be open to the community, so they only offered it for sale to the city of Saratoga.

After a half a century, Hakone ceased to be a private estate and became a public garden that belongs to Saratoga.

In the following decades, the city went through the challenges of operating 18 acres of gardens and maintaining the buildings and hired expert landscape gardeners. In 2000 Hakone Foundation was established for the preservation and continued enhancement of the gardens for future generations, with Lon Saavedra as executive director and CEO. I have been privileged in the last several years to serve on the board of the foundation with fellow trustees who support and truly love Hakone. I am proud that Hakone is a treasure of Silicon Valley and becoming a global forum for culture and ideas from Asia and the Western Hemisphere. Everyone is invited to become a member and be a "partner" in sustaining Hakone.

I have never seen the gardens more beautiful and vibrant than at the festival on May 18. How resilient Hakone is, for after the day of hosting thousands of people, thanks to the many volunteers and staff, it was returned it to its former tranquil state.

I invite your readers to visit Hakone's Cultural Exchange Center, built in 1991 as an authentic replica of a tea merchant's house. This building opened for the first time as an art gallery during the Year of the Horse lunar celebration, showcasing "The Horse in Asian Art." Please come see the current exhibit, Japanese-inspired American Contemporary Ceramics, and have your own private, serene Hakone experience.

Connie Young Yu

Los Altos Hills

Connie Young Yu is the president of the board of trustees for the Hakone Foundation.